1. all Israel] i.e. all the Southern Kingdom; compare note on xi. 3. The details of Judah’s apostasy are given in 1 Kings xiv. 22–24.
²And it came to pass in the fifth year of king Rehoboam, that Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem, because they had trespassed against the Lord,
2. Shishak] The Egyptian king has commemorated this expedition in a pictorial inscription on the wall of the temple of Karnak. It appears that the Northern Kingdom suffered as well as the Southern; much spoil was carried off, but no permanent conquest of Canaan was attempted. (Breasted, History of Egypt, pp. 529 f.)
because they had trespassed] A touch characteristic of the Chronicler; compare xiii. 18, xxi. 10, xxiv. 24, xxv. 20, xxvii. 6, xxviii. 19; and 1 Chronicles x. 13, 14. The Chronicler sees the working of temporal rewards and of temporal punishments everywhere.
³with twelve hundred chariots, and threescore thousand horsemen: and the people were without number that came with him out of Egypt; the Lubim, the Sukkiim, and the Ethiopians.
3. with twelve hundred chariots] The details given in this verse are absent from 1 Kings.
Lubim] i.e. the Libyans of North Africa. Shishak was a leader of Libyan mercenaries. He made himself master of Egypt circa 950 B.C., and is known as the founder of the XXIInd dynasty.
Sukkiim] LXX. Τρωγλοδύται, i.e. the cave dwellers of the mountains which fringe the west coast of the Red Sea. But whether these are really meant here is doubtful.
⁴And he took the fenced cities which pertained to Judah, and came unto Jerusalem.
4. the fenced cities] Compare xi. 5.